{"id":5248,"date":"2025-02-15T20:20:29","date_gmt":"2025-02-16T01:20:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/?page_id=5248"},"modified":"2025-08-19T12:45:20","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T16:45:20","slug":"consumer-protection","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/consumer-protection\/","title":{"rendered":"Consumer Protection"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

HOW TO USE THE RESTATEMENT OF CONSUMER CONTRACTS: A GUIDE FOR JUDGES<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Ian Ayres & Gregory Klass1<\/a><\/sup>Ian Ayres, Oscar M. Ruebhausen Professor, Yale Law School; Gregory Klass Frederick J. Haas Chair in Law and Philosophy, Georgetown University Law Center. Mingyi Hua, Richard Peay, and Ronglu Sun provided excellent research assistance.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Many significant changes to contract law over the past hundred years have been driven by changes in the technology of contracting\u2014the mechanisms people use (or try to use) to create or alter their legal relationships. Early in the twentieth century, cheap printing and mass markets paved the way for standard-form contractual writings and adding terms to noncontractual documents, such as purchase orders and parking receipts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

A COMPANION GUIDE TO THE RESTATEMENT OF CONSUMER CONTRACTS<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Oren Bar-Gill, Omri Ben-Shahar, & Florencia Marotta-Wurgler2<\/a><\/sup>Bar-Gill is the William J. Friedman and Alicia Townsend Friedman Professor of Law and Economics at Harvard Law School. Ben-Shahar is the Leo and Eileen Herzel Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago Law School. Marotta-Wurgler is the Boxer Family Professor of Law at the New York Universirty School of Law.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

In 2012, we were invited to serve as Reporters for a new and ambitious project of the American Law Institute (\u201cALI\u201d) \u2013 a Restatement of Consumer Contracts. We were charged with the task of codifying the common law governing consumer contracts. This was a gutsy move by the ALI, entrusting a sacred doctrinal enterprise in the hands of outsiders to the ALI culture. We are scholars devoted to studying the effects of laws and whether they achieve their intended consequences. In our research on consumer protection, we studied which regulatory reforms work well, which are futile, and which do more harm than good. Our research harbored only modest ambitions in the study of what the law is<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

CONSUMERS\u2019 UNREASONABLE TEXTUAL EXPECTATIONS<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
David A. Hoffman3<\/a><\/sup>William A. Schnader Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania Carey School of Law. I\u2019m grateful to the organizers and participants at the Restatement of Consumer Contracts conference for comments.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

The Restatement of Consumer Contracts, at \u00a7 4(d), states that \u201cstandard contract terms are interpreted in a manner that effectuates the reasonable expectations of the consumer.\u201d As the Reporters note, this language derives from the Restatement (Second) of Contracts \u00a7 211, itself largely pulled from the insurance context. As \u00a7 211 was until recently thought to be nearly dead-letter, the Consumer Restatement\u2019s interest in revitalizing the reasonable expectations rule (for interpretation and elsewhere in the document) is of particular interest. The Reporters offer a helpfully capacious definition of what consumers reasonably expect: A \u201ctotality of the circumstances,\u201d test \u201cin consideration of the ordinary behavior and perspective of consumers engaged in the type of transaction at issue and their interaction with the business, including the representations made to them, the typical purpose of such transactions, and the preservation of value of the nonstandard or core terms of the deal.\u201d But it\u2019s fair to worry that judges will be unable to reliably make this kind of holistic determination in individual cases, as they lack information about consumers\u2019 ordinary practices. In this Essay, I summarize the available evidence of what consumers have in mind when they interpret contracts, and a methodological options judges have before them in making reasoned determinations. Contrary to advocates\u2019 hopes, \u00a7 4(d)\u2019s interpretation principle will be\u2014even if adopted\u2014unlikely to produce uniformly pro-consumer outcomes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

INFLECTION POINTS IN THE DRAFTING OF THE RESTATEMENT OF CONSUMER CONTRACTS: SALIENCE AND ITS ARC<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Patricia A. McCoy4<\/a><\/sup>Liberty Mutual Insurance Professor, Boston College Law School. Professor McCoy was an Adviser to the Restatement of the Law, Consumer Contracts.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

All Reporters come to Restatement projects with priors, and that was no less true for the Restatement of the Law, Consumer Contracts (\u201cRCK\u201d or \u201cRestatement\u201d). One of the RCK\u2019s Reporters, Omri Ben-Shahar, had coauthored an acclaimed book detailing disclosure\u2019s failure to afford consumer protection. Another Reporter, Florencia Marotta-Wurgler, had conducted definitive research demonstrating that almost no consumers read the terms and conditions in online contracts. The Reporters were concerned about consumer harm, yet skeptical of disclosure as the appropriate regulatory tool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

NARROWING THE FRAME: CONSUMER INSURANCE POLICIES AND THE LIMITS OF THE RESTATEMENT OF CONSUMER CONTRACTS<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Daniel Schwarcz5<\/a><\/sup>Fredrikson & Byron Professor of Law, University of Minnesota Law School.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Efforts to restate the law must contend with a fundamental framing challenge: Determining how broadly or narrowly to define the area of law to be addressed. This decision inevitably involves trade-offs. Narrow formulations may yield nuanced and precise rules, but risk diminishing the utility of the restatement and obscuring overarching themes and objectives. Conversely, broad formulations may provide a more comprehensive view of the law, but risk oversimplifying its nuances, conflating distinct lines of precedent, and overlooking critical details.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

A DEMOCRATIC CONCEPTION OF CONSUMER CONTRACTS<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Rebecca Stone6<\/a><\/sup>Professor, UCLA School of Law. Thanks to Jon Quong and participants at the ALI Sym- posium on the Restatement of Consumer Contracts for helpful comments. Thanks also to Raj Ashar and the editors of the Harvard Business Law Review for excellent editorial assistance.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

I sketch and briefly evaluate two standard ways of conceptualizing the problem that is posed by consumer contracts and defend a third view, which is based on my democratic conception of contract. According to the first, the power asymmetry between sellers and consumers means that we should not view consumer contracts as genuine contracts but rather as illegitimate exercises of private law-making by sellers for their consumers. According to the second, which broadly aligns with the approach of the Restatement of Consumer Contracts, consumer contracts are genuine contracts but of a procedurally defective kind. On the view I defend, the essence of the problem is not the compromised assent of consumers, but rather the tendency of sellers to set terms without regard for consumers\u2019 interests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

RESTATEMENT OF THE LAW, CONSUMER CONTRACTS AND THE \u201cTOTALITY OF THE CIRCUMSTANCES\u201d<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Steve Weise7<\/a><\/sup>Partner, Proskauer Rose LLP; UCLA School of Law, Lecturer in Law; Member, Council of the American Law Institute; Member, Permanent Editorial Board for the Uniform Commercial Code.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

The concept of using the \u201ctotality of the circumstances\u201d plays a central role in the Restatement of the Law, Consumer Contracts (Restatement). The Restatement regularly uses this approach to evaluate the matters identified in the following paragraph. The Restatement uses a \u201ctotality of the circumstances\u201d test to determine when a \u201cfeature of the parties\u2019 conduct or communications\u201d is \u201creasonable\u201d (when required to be \u201creasonable\u201d by the Restatement), and identify a consumer\u2019s reasonable expectations in connection with the interpretation of a consumer contract.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF MISLEADINGNESS: A STUDY AND A RESEARCH AGENDA<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Tess Wilkinson-Ryan8<\/a><\/sup>Golkin Family Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. I am grateful to Oren Bar-Gill, Omri Ben-Shahar, and Florencia Marotta-Wurgler for hosting the symposium and for their feedback. I am also thankful to David Hoffman, Michael Morse, and Ben Sirolly for generous comments and discussions. Finally, I am indebted to Selma Halal and Cristina Bermudez for their excellent research assistance.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Traditional contract doctrine, at least as it exists in the casebooks, seems surprisingly indifferent to the problems of deception. Contract law has one big move to protect against deception: a strict liability approach to breach that grants expectation damages whether the promise was untruthful or just optimistic. Unlike showing fraud in tort, which includes an intent element, the uniform approach of contract doctrine is to hold fraudsters to their promises whether or not the injured party can prove a promise was a lie. But once we move past contract\u2019s big move\u2014the plaintiff-friendly protection of the expectation interest irrespective of deceptive intent\u2014the indifference to deception can be a doctrinal gift to the would-be deceivers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

IS YOUR DEBIT CARD THE REASON EVERYTHING IS SO EXPENSIVE?<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Robert Pedersen9<\/a><\/sup>Robert Pedersen, J.D. Candidate, Harvard Law School. I would like to express my gratitude to the Editorial team for their help in reviewing and editing this Column.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Cost of living was the top financial concern for in the 2024 presidential election. The Department of Justice (DOJ) points to an apolitical culprit for some of the elevated cost of living: your debit card. In its September 2024 civil antitrust lawsuit, the DOJ alleges that Visa has amassed monopolistic power in the debit network industry, thereby stifling competition. Therefore, the suit states, Visa is able to charge higher fees than it would be able to in a competitive market, which result in higher prices for consumers. In its defense, Visa claims that there are myriad sources for consumers to pay for goods, and the suit ignores these competitors. The outcome of this antitrust suit will impact the roughly 100 billion debit transactions completed in the U.S. annually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

IS FEDNOW THE SOLUTION, A SOLUTION, OR NO SOLUTION<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Muhui Shi10<\/a><\/sup>Visiting Researcher, Harvard Law School; SJD candidate, University of Michigan Law School. I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to Professors Howell Jackson, John Pottow, and Jeffery Zhang for their invaluable guidance and insightful advice. I am also deeply appreciative of Professors Eric Christiansen and Julian Arato for their unwavering support and warm encouragement.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

The new FedNow system promised to restore the U.S. payment system to its rightful place with once-in-a-generation innovation. Against popular belief, this paper, based on recent data on FedNow\u2019s operation, argues that this proclaimed game-changer is an empty promise. The failure of FedNow\u2014going beyond structural designs, consumer protection, or governance level\u2014was rooted in the Fed\u2019s involvement. The Fed\u2019s involvement in the real-time retail payment market was both unnecessary and poorly timed. FedNow, offering almost identical service to its private counterpart, RTP, is now stuck in an awkward place; it should have been implemented before RTP entered the market or waited for RTP to fully develop the market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 1 \u2022 PRINT<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

“PRICE DISCRIMINATION” DISCRIMINATION<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Talia B. Gillis11<\/a><\/sup>Associate Professor, Columbia Law School. The author would like to thank Ian Ayres, Nikita Aggarwal, Neil Bhutta, Matthew Bruckner, Jessica Bulman-Pozen, Raul Carrillo, Kelly Cochran, Luke Herrine, Howell Jackson, Madhav Khosla, Ela Leshem, Wenli Li, Dorothy Lund, Justin McCrary, Lev Menand, Vitaly Meursault, Haggai Porat, Jeff Sovern, Eric Talley, Rory Van Loo, and participants in the Cardozo Law Symposium on Automating Bias, the Wharton FinReg Conference 2022, the Alabama Law Faculty Colloquium, the Wayne State Faculty Workshop, the NYU Public Law Workshop and the NYU Colloquium on Innovation Policy for thoughtful comments. Brent Allen, Elena Carroll-Maestripieri, Susie Emerson, Sean Kwon, DanLan Luo, Ryan Sandler, Sahil Soni, and Reece Walter provided excellent research assistance.<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Credit price personalization, where lenders set prices based on individual borrower and loan characteristics, is a common practice across many loan types, with conventional accounts of its harms focusing on the ways in which risk-based pricing, or setting prices based on borrowers\u2019 credit risk, can lead to disparities for protected groups like racial minorities and women. This Article examines an often-overlooked yet potentially harmful form of price personalization\u2014charging borrowers different rates based on their willingness-to-pay, known as price discrimination\u2014and argues that this practice can exploit vulnerable borrowers, including protected groups like racial minorities and women, by imposing higher costs unrelated to their credit risk, resulting in what I term \u201cprice discrimination\u201d discrimination. Beyond entrenching financial disparities, price discrimination can exacerbate default risks, especially as the use of big data and artificial intelligence can make price discrimination more pervasive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 9 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

HEALTH INSURANCE PLAN REGULATION AFTER THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT: A COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS COMPARISON<\/a><\/strong>
<\/i><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Marlan Golden<\/i><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

In a rapidly evolving healthcare landscape, particularly since the enactment of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2010, regulators have confronted a number of challenges in crafting general rules of prospective applicability for health insurance plans. These challenges include quantifying costs and benefits of regulatory actions that seem difficult to predict, monetizing certain benefits, satisfying the demands of a robust cost-benefit analysis regime, and accounting for heightened uncertainty in the healthcare markets and recently, on Capitol Hill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 9 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

THE CFPB ARBITRATION RULE<\/a><\/strong>
<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Andrew Palmer<\/em><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

This paper analyzes the recent enactment and subsequent rescission of the Arbitration Agreements Rule12<\/a><\/sup>Arbitration Agreements, 82 Fed. Reg. 33,210 (July 19, 2017) (to be codified at 12 C.F.R. pt. 1040).<\/span>(Arbitration Rule or Rule) promulgated by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau), which bans the use of mandatory arbitration clauses in many types of financial contracts. Specifically, the paper will examine the life and death of the Rule through the lens of the types of cost-benefit analyses (CBA) undertaken by the Bureau in issuing the Rule. This analysis will consider the unique structure and administrative position of the CFPB, and use its authorizing legislation in the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act13<\/a><\/sup>Formally, the statute is the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, Pub. L. No. 111-203, 124 Stat. 1376 (2010).<\/span>(Dodd-Frank or DFA) to compare and contrast its cost-benefit analysis procedures with that of other administrative agencies, particularly in the financial regulatory space. Beyond the narrow scope of the application to the Arbitration Rule\u2014and its rescission\u2014this analysis will necessarily touch on larger constitutional, procedural, and governance challenges to the existence structure of the CFPB, a major contributor to the ire over the Rule in question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 6 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

CAN VOLUNTARY PRICE DISCLOSURES FIX THE PAYDAY LENDING MARKET?<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Jim Hawkins<\/i><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Eric J. Chang\u2019s provocative article, www.PayDayLoans.gov: A Solution for Restoring Price-Competition to Short-Term Credit Loans<\/a>\u2014which, as its title suggests, proposes to facilitate price competition in the payday lending market by creating a federal online exchange for payday lenders to post lending rates\u2014has sparked thoughtful reactions among consumer borrowing experts. This Response provides constructive criticism to Chang\u2019s proposal, arguing that such an exchange is unlikely to meet its goal of restoring price competition and offering tweaks that would raise the likelihood of doing so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 6 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

WWW.PAYDAYLOANS.GOV: A SOLUTION FOR RESTORING PRICE-COMPETITION TO SHORT-TERM CREDIT LOANS<\/strong><\/a> <\/i><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Eric J. Chang<\/i><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Much of United States financial regulation has been predominantly based upon using mandated disclosure to facilitate price-competition. However, in the realm of payday lending, disclosure based regulation has received significant criticisms from regulators and consumer advocates. While federal action may be necessary to solve the payday lending problem, this Article argues that a movement towards stricter and more stifling regulations is an overreaction to the statement that disclosure is not working. Instead, this Article proposes a less burdensome but much more effective alternative: a federal online exchange for payday lenders to list and post lending rates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 2 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

REGULATING PAYDAY LOANS: WHY THIS SHOULD MAKE THE CFPB’S SHORT LIST<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Nathalie Martin<\/em><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

In response to the nation\u2019s biggest financial challenge since the depression, Congress enacted the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (the \u201cAct\u201d), which in turn created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (the \u201cCFPB\u201d).  The mission of the CFPB is to ensure that \u201cmarkets for consumer financial products and services are fair, transparent, and competitive.\u201d  The Act prohibits unfair, deceptive, and abusive acts, and charges the CFPB with creating rules and enforcement actions against all covered persons that engage in an \u201cunfair, deceptive, and abusive act or practice.\u201d  The Act also requires that the CFPB regulate consumer disclosures and test consumers to see how those disclosures are working.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 2 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

DEBIT INTERCHANGE REGULATION: ANOTHER BATTLE OR THE END OF THE WAR?<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Stacie E. McGinn and Mark Chorazak<\/em><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

As one governor of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (the \u201cBoard\u201d or \u201cFederal Reserve\u201d) recently observed, \u201cthe financial crisis spawned or strengthened many reform agendas\u2014among them consumer protection, securities and commodities market regulation, and traditional bank regulation.\u201d  The crisis also created opportunities unrelated to these reform agendas.  At least one group\u2014merchants\u2014realized a legislative goal that had been unimaginable a year earlier:  giving the Federal Reserve the authority to set debit interchange rates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 1 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

CONSUMER CASUALTIES?<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Amy J. Schmitz <\/em><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

On July 21, President Obama signed into law the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank), which among other things calls for creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to serve as a centralized agency charged with protecting consumers from lending abuses and improper practices. The question is when and whether this agency will come to fruition\u2014or suffer as a casualty of political warfare. This CFPB has instigated a firestorm among liberals and conservatives. Liberals raise the CFPB as an engine for consumer protection from rampant lender abuses and \u201cbig bad banks.\u201d Conservatives denounce the Bureau as expensive regulatory fluff in a \u201cleftist\u201d campaign to take over private business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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VOLUME 1 \u2022 COLUMNS<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

FINRA PROPOSED RULE CHANGE WOULD GIVE CUSTOMERS OPTION OF ALL-PUBLIC ARBITRATION PANELS<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Barbara Black <\/em><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Brokerage firms customarily include in their customers\u2019 agreements a predispute arbitration agreement requiring that investors arbitrate their disputes before an arbitration panel of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA). Current rules governing customers\u2019 claims over $100,000 require each three-person panel to include one non-public, or industry, arbitrator in addition to one public arbitrator and one chair-qualified public arbitrator. Investor advocates long have argued that the mandatory inclusion of an arbitrator with ties to the securities industry was unfair to investors and gave the securities industry one decision-maker who would be sympathetic to its position.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VOLUME 15 \u2022 ISSUE 2 HOW TO USE THE RESTATEMENT OF CONSUMER CONTRACTS: A GUIDE FOR JUDGES Ian Ayres & […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":109,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-5248","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/PgKEUK-1mE","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":5412,"url":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/volume-15-issue-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":5248,"position":0},"title":"Volume 15, Issue 2","author":"wgu","date":"July 5, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"VOLUME 15 \u2022 CONSUMER PROTECTION HOW TO USE THE RESTATEMENT OF CONSUMER CONTRACTS: A GUIDE FOR JUDGES Ian Ayres & Gregory Klass Many significant changes to contract law over the past hundred years have been driven by changes in the technology of contracting\u2014the mechanisms people use (or try to use)\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5347,"url":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/volume-15-issue-1\/","url_meta":{"origin":5248,"position":1},"title":"Volume 15, Issue 1","author":"wgu","date":"March 4, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"SECURITIES & FINANCIAL REGULATION CAN SECTION 11 BE SAVED?: \u201cTRACING\u201d A PATH TO ITS SURVIVAL John C. Coffee, Jr. & Joshua Mitts Last term, a unanimous Supreme Court held in Slack Techs. v Pirani that purchasers of securities must \u201ctrace\u201d their shares to the registration statement that contains the alleged\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4672,"url":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/hblr-online-volume-9\/","url_meta":{"origin":5248,"position":2},"title":"Volume 9 (2018\u20132019)","author":"wgu","date":"May 9, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"HUMAN RIGHTS & LABOR SAVING LIVES THROUGH SHAMING Sharon Yadin The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) routinely employs shaming tactics toward employers, using public denunciations disseminated through social media, press releases, and online databases. These tactics, termed by the agency \u201cregulation by shaming,\u201d aim to name and shame companies\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4916,"url":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/hblr-online-volume-12\/","url_meta":{"origin":5248,"position":3},"title":"Volume 12 (2021-2022)","author":"wgu","date":"February 26, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"ENVIRONMENTAL, SOCIAL, & GOVERNANCE \u2022 INVESTING & ASSET MANAGEMENT BROWN ASSETS FOR THE PRUDENT INVESTOR Alon Brav and J.B. Heaton Most commentary on climate-themed investment treats climate change as a one-way risk to brown assets from a hoped-for transition to a low-carbon economy. But the converse holds as well. Brown\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4844,"url":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/volume-11\/","url_meta":{"origin":5248,"position":4},"title":"Volume 11 (2020\u20132021)","author":"wgu","date":"January 11, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"TAXATION \u2022 TECHNOLOGY & INNOVATION RETHINKING TAX FOR THE DIGITAL ECONOMY AFTER COVID-19 Tarc\u00edsio Diniz Magalh\u00e3es and Allison Christians Before COVID-19 arrived, policymakers from around the world were busy working on the makings of a new global tax consensus to reflect structural changes in the world economy as a result\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5127,"url":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/volume-14-2023-2024\/","url_meta":{"origin":5248,"position":5},"title":"Volume 14 (2023\u20132024)","author":"wgu","date":"April 25, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"CORPORATE LAW & GOVERNANCE THE FALLACY OF COMPLETE CORPORATE SEPARATENESS Mariana Pargendler Legal discourse about business entities has displayed a logical fallacy regarding the consequences of corporate separateness. A fallacy of equivocation occurs when a term is used with one meaning in the premise and with another meaning in the\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/109"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5248\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/hblr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}